The only good thing I’ve noticed about the Carsoran Power Axe so far is Justaerian can replace theirs with a lightning claw for free. Another great video, thanks!
I was very disappointed with the sons of horus rules. Was planning one with reavers and dropassault. However the rules do not favor any of this. Its an army that is great at nothing and could be considered as having no legion rules at all, just vanilla.
Death dealers doesnt say the unit within 12 has to make the reaction just that when one of your units within 12 is targeted by a ranged attack a unit may make that reaction meaning any unit in your army can shoot the enemy unit targeting a friendly unit with 12
Exactly. If say, a dreadnought fires at your troops from within 12”, you can have your own dreadnought or any other unit with LoS to fire at the opponent’s dreadnought.
SoH are universal, can be played in a multitude of ways, and suffer from it if compared to specialized legions. Some units like Reavers and Justaerin perform quite good, but are very pricey, looking forward to part 2 for thoughts on that ;) Traits and gear are mediocre, Merciless fighters though usefull feels out of place, adding a survivability and not a damage mechanic. Infantry in ramming Rhinos, Terminator madness, Reaver reaving, and Astartess vanilla are all viable, even if not outstanding…
As a Luna wolf player, I actually I'm not the biggest fan of the trait. It is super strong against traitors, and nothing against loyalists. Which is kinda feels bad either way. I feel like I'll probably more often use the armour of pride.
The carsoran axe is really lacklustre, which is a shame. Its just a worse lightning claw in my opinion. You get Breaching 5+ but lose shred and rend 6+? . Once you then compare it to solarite Gauntlets,terranic swords ,the UM axes etc they just look poorer Pretty much agree with everything you've said. I hoped the faq/ ERRATA might have fixed a few bits on death dealers and merciless fighters but sadly no. I'm still enjoying HH and SoH but as you pointed out ( and my XP so far) is that vs a shooty army,the LTs and AR just don't come into it.
Why the heck do reavers have to pay double to upgrade from chain axe to power weapon than veterans who only have chain swords as default? Makes no sense at all. All SoH stuff is way overpriced for no concernible reason. The whole legion is somehow badly written and feels rushed.
re strong traits locked to 'opposite' loyalty - I'd guess this is a balancing factor given that all but one primarch and then a bunch of other special characters are locked to the 'standard' loyalty.
Maybe so. But ultimately just means some legions get 2 warlord traits, and in multiple cases, 2 weak ones. Then you look at imperial fists with 3 amazing ones not faction-locked at all…
Someone else said it but it’s true. Sons of Horus are not a weak legion but they don’t have a lot of rules or tactics. But they are a universal legion, you can run them a lot of ways. They are similar to the ultramarines in that any strategy works with them but they are more geared towards close combat and medium range firefights. Abaddon is hands down the best fighting oriented special character in the HQ slot out of all the legions and Horus is the best primarch in the game even before you give him the 400pt upgrade to make him a chaos meatsuit. Even then 400pts is a lot of points for what you get. They just need to add more. Solid middle of the road legion.
Death dealers seriously sucks. I've gotten it to work like 3 times. And it was only really effective once. I've found chosen of the dark God's pretty solid on my Cataphractii Preator.
@@paulbradley6941 are you insinuating that the reactive unit could be some other unit than the one who’s being shot at? If so, and if you play it like that, then yes it’s a pretty good reaction.
I think Death Dealers works differently to what you have written. When a unit is targeted while within 12 they don't have to be the ones to return fire. Any unit with range and LOS can do the return fire for you. So if my tacticals are 10" away from a unit of terminators that are shooting them I can activate Death dealers and fire on the terminators with my unit of lascannons 20" away in a building that's overlooking them. At least that's my reading, and how I've seen most people understand it online
Thats how people want it to work, not how it actually does work, in my opinion. Its poorly written for sure but takes some wilful misinterpretetion to think that any unit can react, or that the reacting unit can shoot units other than the triggering unit, which ive seen too.
Yeh, i dont see why it couldnt have been something like that to make it worthwhile. Or just return fire infinite range with +1 BS so it at least had a reason to exist.
@@Hearesy that's it,just something beyond return fire at bs+1. It just feels more like something you'd see in fists or UMs. The move based ones are so strong and so useful that I think something abit more flavoured would be cool
Justaerin also suck. They are slow, expensive close combat. So easy to avoid or just play around them with reactions. If you put them in transport, you are going to be outgunned and clubbed to death. SoH sucks, and they sucks hard.
Will watch this tonight. My faction so will be good. Really frustrated with how little time my LTs seem active compared to my opponents. Hopefully learn some info from this
Personally I hope that sons Reaction dose get a update that makes them a bit better. Most leigons have a defined play style that is a massive advantage IE fist and their sheilds, but sons are just extremely lacking. I hope death dealer's gets updated to kill and then modify the targets shots appropriately with losses.
I would love to see some more math hammer about what the buffs and weapons can do. We all might be in agreement that the axes are bad but what is the actual wounds inflicted difference between them and power fists?
To each their own on the Carsoran Power Axes. While I wouldn't go out of my way to take them outside of base stock in a unit of Justaerin Terminators (and even then it's better to upgrade from there), their Specialist Weapon special rule makes them a cheap way for a Sons of Horus character to get +1 attack for additional close combat weapons when paired with another Specialist weapon like a paragon blade, power fist, or thunder hammer. Just about anyone else would need to take a power fist at least for the same effect, meaning that you can save a few points for upgrades elsewhere in the army (if not giving the character some melta bombs).
@@DirtyMardi Valid, though it is only true for some units such as veteran squads, basic command squad retinue, Justaerin Terminators and independent characters (it's even cheaper on the praetor, weirdly enough). Again, it does come down to that Specialist trait being a limiting factor all the same (making them a poor choice for most squad sergeants), and I would actually go so far as to say that lightning claws are discounted as such specifically because they *need* to be paired with another Specialist weapon (especially another lightning claw) in order to be optimally effective. In the end though, it is a moot point when the objective is to guarantee that another Specialist weapon (paragon blade in this case, though thunder hammers, chainfists, and power fists all apply equally) can gain that +1 attack for additional close combat weapons.
I just don't get how people sleep on SoH. Their Legion trait means that your Terminators will essentially be twice as tough as your opponents. That beats out being harder to hit, 3+ Invulns, extra attacks and even flawless execution, meaning you will win Terminator on Terminator fights every time and you don't have to do anything to get it. And its not like their rules wouldn't scream at you to use the trait this way with both their RoWs giving you 2w Troops and Terminator delivery Options. The Carsoran is pretty bad but it is a straight upgrade over the basic power weapon it replaces, its just that basic power weapons aren't very good in this Edition. Justaerin, if upgraded with Thunderhammers will butcher any other Elite-Infantry in the Game. Unless your gamegroup just lets Dreadnoughtspam run rampant SoH should be a top-tier Legion.
The elite v elite fight is a small part of most games, if its even relevant at all. A small part of a smaller percentage of games does not make a good legion trait. If you happen to have nothing but melee opponents im sure theyd feel good, but against the wide range of loyalists - many of which are shooting armies at their core - the trait spends a lot of time off.
@@Hearesy If your opponent doesnt bring elite melee you may not get much use from your trait but you won't need it to win then either. Terminators are extremely difficult to kill at range in this edition, especially if you only get intercept shots due to DS/outflank.
Its massive people are just not gearing their armies to use the rule. Also as strong as they are I think i librarian is pretty essential to make the most of closing the distance on a very shooty army
Take 3 squads of Justaerin (1 in HQ) and deep strike them to opponent rear at night to cause some pinning shenanigans. Throw in a contemptor or two for good measure, and assault squads. That’ll get you close and to use your legion trait. Bring a librarian or an apotechary to taste.
